I'm going to get ranked straight to Hades for this, but this is just another example of how Microsoft—despite somehow creating Metro, which I thought was beautiful—does not have great taste when it comes to appealing design. (Maybe it's a personal thing; the commenter who referenced DreamWorks was spot on, and I have always thought their style was awkward, ugly, and honestly unsettling.)

Taste is personal, but it's an odd choice. The aesthetic makes me think more of Nintendo's Splatoon than it does of any Xbox game.

Something about the avatar is quite punchable, though. If the design brief was to create an obnoxious little cretin, then it's a roaring success.

Even from the still images above, I can almost imagine the avatar playing loud music (via an oversized smartphone) on the train and then telling me to "shut up, it's a free country" when I ask him to turn it down.

Oh, but this is the point here! You go home, you hop into the avatar builder, design the little sh1tface, then drop the model into a shooter game and make him swiss cheese. Or at least I hope you'll be able to play as your avatar in some shooter, so you can do this. Otherwise what's the point?

Sure, don't use it. Windows already has account pictures, and I assume you don't use those.

You presume "don't use it" will be a choice.

It very well MIGHT be a choice, but using an account picture (the default) has been MANDATORY in all iterations of Windows. You literally don't have a choice OF using it. You have infinite choices of what one to use. But you HAVE TO USE ONE, or one will be assigned by default.

I like the use of all caps to try and GIVE your argument more WEIGHT than it DESERVES.

Avatar technology seems to be on the up again, presumably as a result of the upswell in VR which happened a few years ago.

However, given that VR has quietly sloped back down into a niche market, are avatars actually of any real use or interest to anyone? Or is it just another feature tickbox that everyone has to have, for fear of looking inferior to the competition?

Anecdotally, back when I was reviewing Xbox Live Indie games, Avatar games were incredibly popular, though as a result the market quickly became saturated with variations on the same themes. However, as with motion controls, VR and plastic instruments, I do have to wonder if avatars are just another short-lived gimmick...

Ah yes, MS's attempt to cash in on Nintendo's Miis. At the very least, they're you know, fine. They don't hurt anything, though it's odd they are putting so much work into "updating" them considering that even Nintendo appears to be quietly abandoning the idea.

Let's not forget that Sony attempted to cash in on them too, with their bizarre attempt at a Second Life clone, except they utterly missed the point. Not only were those things far too "realisitic" to ever really work (no style of their own at all), but they were never used outside Sony's weird vChat experiment, so what was even the point?

In terms of how appealing they are, I would rank it Miis, then Avatars, then waaaay below that whatever Sony called their people things.

The only thing I don't care about more than Microsoft at this point is Microsoft/Xbox avatars/the whole Xbox social network. Hell, the only reason I even waste time thinking about the former at this point is out of concern of what misguided new "X as a service" or platform they'll use their clout to attempt to force on the games industry.

The whole Microsoft involvement in the games industry/Xbox brand in general is like that friend that used to be cool, then did something REALLY fucked up to betray your friend groups trust, and now everyone just kind of tolerates them but they keep making jokes about "hey remember when I did that thing? That was really messed up, I'd never do that again though!" but everyone is still weirded out that they're going to do that thing again because they keep doing things that are fucked up, just not as fucked up as that one big thing.

My kids really enjoy customizing avatars, even if they think the characters look weird. They just find the activity if dreasing up a character to be fun.

I dont care for these avatars, but that just means i’ll interact with them a little as possible. Most my interactions will be with my kids when they're playing around.

I don’t understand the hate towards these things. They’re ugly. But trying to pretend that these avatars are taking away from what other consider more important features is ridiculous. And it may annoy people if Microsoft forces people to create a character, especially on Windows, but hopefullu and likely it will be a one time thing and you can forget about it.

What makes me the most sad about avatars was that, originally, the developers at Rare were responsible for them. It seemed like a waste of the talent MS had acquired. Its nice to see Rare getting back into game development with Sea of Theaves, even is that game isnt what i’d want from Rare. I’d be chrious to know if the avatar team is still part of Rare.

"Avatars" for Windows 10... Yet I can't choose anything beyond a predetermined amount of colors for the "system accent" and "night mode" only changes all the new GUI elements. What a fucking waste of priorities.

"Avatars" for Windows 10... Yet I can't choose anything beyond a predetermined amount of colors for the "system accent" and "night mode" only changes all the new GUI elements. What a fucking waste of priorities.

It's a redesign of the existing Xbox avatars, but this time they're making it platform-agnostic, so the work can be used on Windows with little additional effort. It was announced as an Xbox feature upgrade, and any Windows integration hasn't been officially confirmed, so it's pretty clear that the work was going to be done for Xbox anyway... so the small amount of effort that team is applying to making it function in Windows is hardly a misapplication of priorities.

What, did you think that they pulled all hands off core Windows development for this? Do you really think that's how this works?

"Avatars" for Windows 10... Yet I can't choose anything beyond a predetermined amount of colors for the "system accent" and "night mode" only changes all the new GUI elements. What a fucking waste of priorities.

It's a redesign of the existing Xbox avatars, but this time they're making it platform-agnostic, so the work can be used on Windows with little additional effort. It was announced as an Xbox feature upgrade, and any Windows integration hasn't been officially confirmed, so it's pretty clear that the work was going to be done for Xbox anyway... so the small amount of effort that team is applying to making it function in Windows is hardly a misapplication of priorities.

What, did you think that they pulled all hands off core Windows development for this? Do you really think that's how this works?

In the end, some amount of Windows development will need to make room for supporting the Avatar feature and making it "useful" within Windows...as "useful" as they are. And don't get me wrong, I'm not raging against Avatars in general, especially as XBL goes. I just see yet another "Microsoft thinks this'll be neat!" regarding Windows that keeps its shambling user interface that still pieces together UI elements all the way back to NT/9x while arbitrarily deciding what functions to deprecate/replace.

"Avatars" for Windows 10... Yet I can't choose anything beyond a predetermined amount of colors for the "system accent" and "night mode" only changes all the new GUI elements. What a fucking waste of priorities.

It's a redesign of the existing Xbox avatars, but this time they're making it platform-agnostic, so the work can be used on Windows with little additional effort. It was announced as an Xbox feature upgrade, and any Windows integration hasn't been officially confirmed, so it's pretty clear that the work was going to be done for Xbox anyway... so the small amount of effort that team is applying to making it function in Windows is hardly a misapplication of priorities.

What, did you think that they pulled all hands off core Windows development for this? Do you really think that's how this works?

In the end, some amount of Windows development will need to make room for supporting the Avatar feature and making it "useful" within Windows...as "useful" as they are. And don't get me wrong, I'm not raging against Avatars in general, especially as XBL goes. I just see yet another "Microsoft thinks this'll be neat!" regarding Windows that keeps its shambling user interface that still pieces together UI elements all the way back to NT/9x while arbitrarily deciding what functions to deprecate/replace.

The article has some poor word choice. There is no indication that this is actually "integrated" into Windows. It's apparent there will be a dedicated app for Windows, much like there's a dedicated Xbox app for Windows, and is currently an Xbox Avatars app for Windows... and the screens of the app show it consistently using Fluent Design paradigms that rely on APIs planned for a future update to Windows.

But that doesn't mean it's integrated into Windows itself in any meaningful way. The next iteration of Fluent Design was always coming (we've known about it for longer than the avatar refresh), regardless of the existence of this update to Xbox Avatars, and the fact that the app appears to depend upon it means either the Avatars are being delayed until that update or, like other Microsoft-published apps before it, it will implement the new design language internally until the API is available at the system level.

So...how long until we get start doing high quality VR modeled avatars ala Snow Crash?

It seems likely that the new Avatars have Mixed Reality/Virtual Reality support as key requirement, given Microsoft's other MR investments. It seemed to be a read-between-the-lines hint in the 2017 E3 announcement as a part of the reasoning behind the new designs being as inclusive as possible (because inclusivity matters a lot if the avatar is representing you in an MR scenario), and even more indirectly in their announcements of Avatar SDKs in both Unity and Unreal engines, in part because ease of development in Unity has already been a huge part of Microsoft's MR push to small/indie developers.

"Avatars" for Windows 10... Yet I can't choose anything beyond a predetermined amount of colors for the "system accent" and "night mode" only changes all the new GUI elements. What a fucking waste of priorities.

It's a redesign of the existing Xbox avatars, but this time they're making it platform-agnostic, so the work can be used on Windows with little additional effort. It was announced as an Xbox feature upgrade, and any Windows integration hasn't been officially confirmed, so it's pretty clear that the work was going to be done for Xbox anyway... so the small amount of effort that team is applying to making it function in Windows is hardly a misapplication of priorities.

What, did you think that they pulled all hands off core Windows development for this? Do you really think that's how this works?

In the end, some amount of Windows development will need to make room for supporting the Avatar feature and making it "useful" within Windows...as "useful" as they are. And don't get me wrong, I'm not raging against Avatars in general, especially as XBL goes. I just see yet another "Microsoft thinks this'll be neat!" regarding Windows that keeps its shambling user interface that still pieces together UI elements all the way back to NT/9x while arbitrarily deciding what functions to deprecate/replace.

The article has some poor word choice. There is no indication that this is actually "integrated" into Windows. It's apparent there will be a dedicated app for Windows, much like there's a dedicated Xbox app for Windows, and is currently an Xbox Avatars app for Windows... and the screens of the app show it consistently using Fluent Design paradigms that rely on APIs planned for a future update to Windows.

But that doesn't mean it's integrated into Windows itself in any meaningful way. The next iteration of Fluent Design was always coming (we've known about it for longer than the avatar refresh), regardless of the existence of this update to Xbox Avatars, and the fact that the app appears to depend upon it means either the Avatars are being delayed until that update or, like other Microsoft-published apps before it, it will implement the new design language internally until the API is available at the system level.

For what it is worth, the Xbox One version of the 360 Avatars (now named Xbox Original Avatars) already works today in Windows 10 (even on rare Windows 10 mobile devices, hah) and "Xbox Play Anywhere" initiative and the overall UWP initiatives encourage all Xbox apps to also run on Windows 10. So it shouldn't be a surprise that a new Avatar app may also support Windows 10.

Also, while not entirely the same Fluent choices as Windows 10, the current/recent Xbox dashboards is considered "Fluent Design" and there are plenty of Fluent Design elements on the dashboard. I think Microsoft considers it a shared design system for both Xbox and Windows moving forward. (If anything, Xbox gets to lead in Fluent Design here a bit, given less "who moved my cheese?!" [corporate] complaints from Xbox users than on Windows.)

Crazy speculation time: I continue to wonder if Sea of Thieves didn't launch with a Pirate editor because it was supposed to launch with the new Avatars? The Rare team did create the Avatars in the first place and their Kinect games have often been the biggest showcases for the Avatars. It would fit if Sea of Thieves was designed to show off some of the flexibility of the new Avatars by piratifying them.

Possibly it's just wishful thinking on my part, as I would love to see a lot of the pirate accessories unlock for Avatars (my main/gamerpic Avatar has been wearing Guybrush Threepwood's coat from LeChuck's Revenge for years now at this point).

Crazy speculation time: I continue to wonder if Sea of Thieves didn't launch with a Pirate editor because it was supposed to launch with the new Avatars? The Rare team did create the Avatars in the first place and their Kinect games have often been the biggest showcases for the Avatars. It would fit if Sea of Thieves was designed to show off some of the flexibility of the new Avatars by piratifying them.

Possibly it's just wishful thinking on my part, as I would love to see a lot of the pirate accessories unlock for Avatars (my main/gamerpic Avatar has been wearing Guybrush Threepwood's coat from LeChuck's Revenge for years now at this point).

I suspect that was likely considered, but given the specific stylistic choices they settled on for the randomized characters (and how consistently they match with the in-game NPCs), I think any plans for integration were scrapped early on. The new Xbox Avatars have a very different feel than the SoT characters.

That said, if they were planned for launch, and end up available in SoT whenever they're available, I'll be quite happy. It'd be nice to be able to manually customize characters, and there's apparently a lot of variety possible in the new avatars which would make things interesting.

Are there even people out there who actually want this kind of thing? Why?

For the same reasons you chose to call yourself a lunatic, or that in-game character creators are popular.

We don't all have to like the same things. If you don't care, just use the default choice and move on with your life.

Is there a default choice to no, I don't want this feature? Because that's the choice I want.

Sure, don't use it. Windows already has account pictures, and I assume you don't use those.

Hopefully it will be easier to choose not using it than it is to not use other things in w10. Personally I feel that all the 'features' of w10 should be optional installs

I'm not a linux freak, but honestly the main reason I don't use linux as much is because I game at random times and it's quicker to just start the game than it is to shutdown/reboot to windows and start the game when I want to.